Level, focus, and force of argumentative criticisms: How do institutional norms come into play?

The goal in this presentation is to better understand how argumentative criticisms work in everyday discourse. It is, more specifically, to examine how corporate actors pioneering the transition to a low-carbon economy respond to criticism that confronts their own business practices. The study focuses on interviews designed to elicit argumentation with the use of a video-elicitation technique: a complex critical argument concerning the usefulness of carbon offsets is presented via a video-excerpt in the course of (N=48) in-depth interviews. I will present the analysis, yet a work-in-progress, of the interviewees’ responses, by paying attention to their level, focus, force, and the norms they appeal to.

As this is one of the first studies conducted within the the Eco-reasoning Project, I will also provide a short overview of the project.